I just harvested some of the spinach and arugula the other day and it was amazing. The taste was wonderful and knowing it was grown in my backyard was a great feeling.

Another thing I discovered this season is that the plants responded much better to rainwater than municipal tap water. So I’ve been collecting rain water in 5  gallon buckets (from the very little rain we get here in Arizona during the spring before the hot summer!) and using it to water the garden as much as possible. It’s making a big difference. Seeds I planted just a few days ago are already sprouting through the earth and others are growing faster with the rain water.

As you noticed in the video, we’re growing greens this time of year including lettuce, spinach and arugula, and are looking forward to planting cucumbers and cantaloupe for the summer in the next month or so.

Here’s a quick video on square foot gardening, an easy method of growing regardless of what type of home you live in.

And this trend of growing at home is growing as evidenced here.

Our raw friend John Kohler grows most of all his own food in his front yard! He shares his reasons for this, the benefits and shows us his yard and how uses square foot gardening to grow hundreds of fruits and vegetables.

Enjoy your garden (and savings!) .

Well, eating a raw food diet is the original, and in my opinion, best way to be green!

When you live a raw food lifestyle, eating fresh fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds, you avoid the packaging associated with eating processed and cooked foods, especially when you use your own reusable shopping bags. Food packaging is one of the biggest sources of garbage. In the past when I ate a S.A.D. diet, and even a vegan diet, I would normally put out a full garbage can every week… and this is for a small household of only two.

Now, 5 years into a raw food diet, I often go 5-6 weeks before putting out the garbage and it is rarely more than just a bag or two, 1/5 full at most. Even the recycling bin is rarely full enough to put out any more than every 4-5 weeks if not longer. You just don’t generate much waste living a natural, raw lifestyle!

And if you compost your food extras as I do, you’re making rich soil for growing your own foods as well. Plus you enjoy another benefit, your traditional garbage is dry and odorless.

Imagine if just 10% of Americans shifted their diet to fresh, whole foods? How dramatically this would reduce waste and impact our environment?

Another reason for living on a raw food diet.

Post your comments below. Would love to hear your thoughts!

Enjoy and peace.

Mark

“Cooked starches are also very fattening. Farmers have even learned that is is necessary to feed their animals cooked food to fatten them up for maximum profit. Hogs do not get fat on raw potatoes, but cooked potatoes make them gain weight.

In addition to reaching your body’s ideal weight, many other beauty factors blossom on a raw diet. Cellulite, which is thought to result from eating heated fats, gradually disappears with the consumption of freshly squeezed grapefruit juice and raw fruits and vegetables. On a raw diet, improved elimination of cellular waste and increased lymphatic drainage help remove cellulite.”

Excerpted from the Live Food Factor
“… arguably the most comprehensive book ever written on the raw diet and lifestyle”
(Get Fresh Magazine, UK).

Learn more about the book and get 80 valuable bonus gifts.

Simply Raw shows the dramatic effect that eating raw and living foods can have on our health. It highlights how by making simple healthy choices when it comes to our food that we can allow our bodies to heal.

Seeing first hand how making a simple lifestyle choice can help you overcome disease, and in particular diabetes, in less than 30 days is incredibly inspiring!

Some of the comments after watching the movie included:

“I Was Captivated Watching Simply Raw”

“I Was Absolutely Astounded”

“I Believe It To be More Important Than Any Current Information Available Today On Getting Health Back…”

And Raw For Life is like the ultimate encyclopedia for raw food living. It includes interviews, research, nutritional information, philosophy and much more. And there was so much footage left after making Simply Raw it was included to make this companion film as an additional resource for the raw foods lifestyle.

In the spirit of appreciation and gratitude and to help spread this message of health and healing to as many as possible, the filmmakers are making both DVD’s available at half off until midnight tonight.

These are must have resources for any health seeker, or as a gift for someone that could use this vital health giving information. They’re informative as well as inspiring. And at half off, it’s easy to share with those that need it most. Do you know anyone with diabetes or is pre-diabetic? Help yourself and others in your life regain their health. Without health, what do you have? I urge you to check them out today.

Peace!

What was my crime?

It was the suggestion to lower or eliminate processed and animal foods from your diet. And in one case, suggesting more fruit snacks for a child over ‘healthy snacks’ like beef jerky’s, crackers, string cheese sticks, milk, chocolate peanut butter, deli roll up meat, laughing cow cheese, and yogurt among other foods. To be fair, there were a few fruits mentioned in the list of healthy snacks (a banana, apple slices, grapes, nectarines), but the majority were the processed foods mentioned above.

Another comment was about the detriments of dairy products, particularly milk in response to a question asking ‘what’s so bad about milk?’. That comment, also quickly removed, discussed the diseases associated with dairy products including: Crohn’s Disease, Asthma, Early Sexual Maturation, Early Breast Growth, Diabetes, Breast Cancer, Colon Cancer, Leukemia, ADD or ADHD, Prostate Cancer, Osteoporosis, Arthritis, Sinuses, Autoimmune Disease, Lung Cancer, Childhood Anemia, Diarrhea & Constipation among others and answered the question. It also discussed how milk is good for calves, but they stop drinking it at about 6-8 months and never drink it again. As well as giving examples of plant based vegetables and nuts that have high amounts of calcium naturally rather than fortified like milk and other dairy products. It also provided a reference to notmilk.com for additional information on the topic.

Interestingly, all the other comments on the blog were glowing with praise on the ‘healthy’ snack suggestions mentioned above. Not one comment challenging anything, except for mine.

But when someone comes along and mentions ‘the king (or queen in this case) isn’t wearing any clothes’, instead of a spirited discussion on the pros and cons of processed and animal foods, the messenger is quickly dismissed and criticized in private. My message was well written and respectful, asking the question ‘why so much processed food’?

Interesting how the messenger was eliminated, but the real question was never answered. There was no reply to the question of eating processed and animal foods, only a sharp criticism and quick removal of the topic. The comment ‘everyone else wrote glowing praises and you were the only one critical’ stood out in her email to me. ‘find someone else to bother’ was the reply.

This reaction isn’t uncommon from most people and it’s simple to explain.

You see, when you decide to keep a closed mind on a subject, like health and food in this case, any suggestion to an alternate way of eating is like an attack. Especially when you are promoting these same beliefs to thousands of blog visitors and clients every day. And in this case, your income may depend on it too.

And this happens in everyday life as well. When you make a suggestion or answer a question about health or wellness, your answer relating to fruits and vegetables, or the raw food diet, is often quickly dismissed as unrealistic or an attack.

But here’s the rub.

If you keep an open mind to seeking what is true, and not just defending your position or current beliefs, you allow yourself to explore and research what’s best for you and your family.

It may be that you decide the ‘SAD’ diet is the best for you. You may decide it’s a vegan diet or a vegetarian diet. Maybe a diet of purely animal foods or just processed foods. Or you may decide it’s a natural raw food diet.

What this does is allow you to be open to alternate ways of eating and most importantly, feeling your best always and achieving optimal health for you and your family. Sticking to the same beliefs you’ve always had, were passed on from your family, relatives or spouse, or from society in general (sometimes the most dangerous to your health), keeps you ’stuck’ in your ways and ready to attack anyone that challenges them. It’s natural to stand up for something, especially when it’s something you’ve been following for a long time. Or sometimes your income depends on it and you allow fear to take over.

And here’s the irony.

Following a mainly natural, fresh and whole food diet allows you to naturally find your way, allows you to keep an open mind, be at peace and be open to new ideas that can enhance your life. You’re less likely to ‘lash out’ at someone and be happy to have a peaceful discussion about any topic without feeling the need to be defensive. Many of the additives in processed foods affect your nervous system and brain, hormones from animal foods also affect your body in many ways that often cause you to be ‘edgy’. Remove them and a calm, peaceful manner comes about you like something you’ve never felt before. It’s truly amazing and wonderful and normally not possible with the toxins found in cooked and processed foods.

I also know this from personal experience as well. I often lashed out at others and had a temper at times. I didn’t know it had to do with what I was eating until after I transitioned to a raw food diet. It was like night and day, but I wouldn’t have noticed it unless I transitioned.

Not until you are ‘cleaned out’ of the toxins will you be able to truly feel the effects of what you eat. I experienced this recently when testing a raw and vegan dehydrated food to review that immediately caused me to have blurry vision and an upset stomach. A year ago this didn’t happen, 6 months ago this didn’t happen. Only when you’ve really cleaned out will your body react in this way, and it should. This is how our body was designed, to give you signals of what is good and not good for your body. But without removing all the processed and cooked foods, you’ll never feel the signals and allow you to respond. And often it’s too late to be able to respond when you’re not cleaned out. How many people do you know that one day were fine and the next day they’re in the hospital?

It saddens me to watch so many around me complain about the same ailments every week resulting in visiting the doctor regularly, only to continue with those complaints again soon after the original symptoms are gone. It’s not that the knowledge of why more fresh fruits, vegetables and some nuts and seeds help you (it’s everywhere!), it’s the decision to be open to learning more about it, and actually trying it for yourself. And not only for a few days, but for a month or longer. Something from a seminar I went to back in 1990 sticks in my mind… ‘you can always go back to eating the way you did if you don’t feel better’. If eating more fruits and veggies don’t allow you to feel better after a month, you can always go back to eating the processed and cooked foods and see the difference for yourself. But if you don’t honestly try, you’ll never know, right?

Also, your outlook on life shifts to focus more on love and peace, not judgement and reaction. You are more at peace, you learn to follow your instincts, truly enjoy life, focus on the good and don’t let things bother you. You do what you love and it doesn’t matter what others say, you follow the truth and your passions. You also feel great and avoid the illnesses and issues most everyone in our society today faces due to their choices of what they put in and onto their bodies.

Some may say this is challenging in today’s society. The quote from Margaret Mead ‘It is easier to change a man’s religion than to change his diet” comes to mind.

I call it seeking the truth and sharing your experiences and knowledge to help others and encourages me to continue as well. And eating a raw food diet is surprisingly simple. The ultimate ‘fast food’. If you’re ready to learn, the teacher will be waiting. But you have to be ready and open to seek the truth and you’ll find it.

‘the truth will set you free’

Let me know what you think by posting a comment below!

Peace and all good things, to your best health!

Mark

Some look at it as a challenge, some as an obstacle, some as the natural thing to do.

After five years experience on the raw food diet, I’d say it’s easier than how I traveled in the past and lots of fun!

I recently had the opportunity to spend a week traveling through California. We visited 4 national forests and 3 national parks, drove over the Golden Gate and Bay Bridges, camped 5 nights and drove over 2000 miles. It was the perfect time to experience how simple it really is to travel on the raw food diet.

BTW, if you haven’t had a chance to see Yosemite National Park in person I highly recommend a trip to the area! Pictures don’t do its natural beauty justice.

Here’s what I brought and ate over these 7 days.

I brought a large cooler, large pocket knife, spoon and canvas shopping bag. Stopping at a farmers market the day before we left, I picked up 6 cantaloupe, 4 cucumbers, 2 avocados, 1 lb of dates and then ran by Whole Foods for 4 bunches of bananas and 2 bags of oranges. Packed everything but bananas and dates in the cooler and we were ready to go. This kept everything organized and in one place.

Kept a little ice on the bottom of the cooler and added more every few days. The produce kept cooler than room temperature the entire week even with just a little ice. In fact I didn’t want to keep them too cool, just wanted to let everything ripen naturally.

For breakfast I enjoyed 2-3 oranges and 5-6 bananas, 2 cantaloupe for lunch and 3-4 tomatoes, 1/2 avocado and 1 cucumber for dinner. Medjool dates made for nice snacks.

It was easy to eat, just pull them out and enjoy. No preparation or garbage generated.

A little more than half way through the trip we stopped at a Whole Foods in California and replenished the same produce to last until I returned home.

Total cost? $85 for the entire week. I did enjoy a nice pint of locally grown figs at the Walnut Creek Whole Foods so that added a little to the total over my regular expenses. A little more than normal but worth every delicious bite!

Compared to those traveling with me constantly searching for fast and canned food throughout the week, I found my simple raw diet easy, healthier and much less expensive than any other alternative. And observing the campers around us also confirmed this. Most had half their vehicle packed with stoves, prepackaged foods, boxes of utensils, napkins, cups and other food related items. Meals for them took hours to prepare, eat and then clean up, not to mention the stops needed, costs to purchase and then the garbage generated.

My raw diet only involved 1 stop on the trip, everything was locally or organically grown and the costs were minimal. I finished with dinner every day around 3pm allowing me to sleep peacefully every night and plenty of time and energy to enjoy our trip.

How about traveling on the raw diet by plane?

In part two of this post I’ll share my most recent experience while traveling to visit family next week. Stay tuned!

What are your experiences? Leave a comment below and let us know.

Enjoy and to your best health. Peace!

Mark

Here’s a question I received recently:

Mark…I started on a raw food diet and juicing fruits and vegetables since a month ago, before that I was a vegan for 25 years now. This is my concern. I’m 90 pounds, 5 ft. 2 in tall, small boned, I do 1hr of cardio exercising. I dont want to lose anymore weight. I am used to small portions of solid food at lunch and take 4 glasses of raw vegetable or fruit juice. How can I retain my weight?

This isn’t uncommon, feel that you’re already at your optimal weight and don’t want to lose more.

This is similar to what I encountered when I first went raw myself, I felt as though I was losing too much weight and was concerned.

What I found happens is that your body first releases everything when you first transition to raw, then it builds up your body with the higher quality food and nutrients so you gain weight back until you reach your optimal weight.. for you. I originally lost more than I expected and felt I was too thin, but over the next year or so gained extra weight plus added muscle by continuing to work out.

I recommend adding resistance and body weight exercises to your routine to add more muscle as well. That will help maintain your overall physique and weight.

I would also recommend adding more whole foods into your raw food diet. That will not only help with fiber, but also with more calories. Add more whole fruits for the same reason, especially if you are concerned with weight loss. Overall whole foods are superior in nutrition to juices since they are in their natural state. Juicing is fine and has its benefits, I just don’t recommend it over whole fruits and vegetables.

To your best health!

Mark

Why do I say almost effortlessly?

Here’s why conditioning your body is quite easy when you remove the obstacles… remove the toxins, processed foods, cooked foods and most unnatural substances from your diet and environment.

You see, when your body doesn’t have to continue to struggle with obstructions, meaning the toxins we just mentioned, it can respond much easier to physical activity, and not need much recovery, if any to longer or more frequent activities.

For example, recently I found myself at a new aquatic center near my home. I normally don’t swim often since most pools I’ve been to in the past in the area use a wide array of chlorine chemicals. To my surprise, this new center uses a salt based filtration system so I decided to enjoy the water.

To give you a quick background, the most I’ve probably swam in a pool throughout my entire life is 2-3 laps continuously without stopping. That’s been the extent.

I noticed that there was a requirement for eligibility in order to be able to attend evening ‘lap night’ and found that you must be able to swim at least 20 laps without stopping. Oh my, 20 laps? Without stopping? Based on the fact that I hadn’t swam for more than 2-3 in my entire life, I wasn’t sure about 20.

Well, always enjoying a challenge, I decided to see how many laps I could do… without stopping.

30.

I was a little sore for a few minutes, but soon felt normal and energetic. In fact, I felt I could have continued (energy wise) but was getting a little dizzy .

Now I’m not special, anyone can do this if they remove the obstacles our bodies battle with every day when we eat cooked foods, processed foods, ingest toxins and dangerous chemicals as well as being exposed to toxins in our environment.

On a raw vegan diet your body easily stays conditioned and you won’t experience cramps, soreness and have plenty of energy to accomplish anything you want. Run 6 miles? Sure. Go hike a mountain? Of course! Swim 30 laps non-stop? Absolutely.

Just stay active regularly and eat a pure, raw, fresh, low fat, whole food diet of fruits, vegetables, nuts and seeds.

And this isn’t just me, ask any raw vegan athlete and they’ll share the same story. I had a friend that could do most any exercise, in most any length of repititions or distance without exhaustion or muscle soreness. He could go on as long as he wanted and enjoyed every minute. Of course this was after he transitioned to a raw vegan lifestyle.

Another benefit to the raw vegan diet.

Peace!

Mark

Related:

Use these two exercises you can do at home, without expensive club memberships or equipment, to stay conditioned, lose weight or tone up.

Now, I haven’t been hiking for about 4 months, partly because of the lack of heat as I mentioned, and expected to take a leisurely hike to ‘break’ myself in to a new season.

Well, it wasn’t a leisurely hike, and not by choice.

You see, as soon as I started up the mountain, I had an urge to move quickly. I felt light on my feet and ran in parts up the mountain. Then it happened.

As I passed a group of hikers one gentleman who was trudging along mentioned that I resembled a ‘billy goat climbing up the mountain without hesitation’. We all laughed and I continued on, like a ‘billy goat’.

Then I got to thinking. 

Never in my 13 years of hiking had I ever felt this energentic. Especially after taking the winter off. I mean, there were times today when I felt I was gliding up with energy that didn’t stop. I’ll say this… it was near effortless. And this is 13 years after I starting hiking regularly.

I ran up many parts on the way up, and all the way down. I wasn’t tired and felt I could continue after the hour long excursion up and down the mountain. Here are some pictures and video:

So why am I telling you this?

Well certainly not to impress you, but instead to impress upon you what is normal for a person that eats a natural diet and stays active. A raw vegan diet mainly consisting of fresh fruits, vegetables and a small amount of nuts or seeds. A low fat raw diet. I say this because there has been controversy within the raw community lately on which is better. More about that in another post coming soon.

You see, the longer I’ve followed eating simple whole foods and stayed active regularly, the more benefits I experience. Not a ‘hollywood’ style raw diet, or the gourmet raw food diet, or a high fat raw diet, or the raw junk food diet. Mainly simple fruits and vegetables, leafy green salads, and smoothies. This goes along with the theory I uncovered in Arnold Ehret’s Mucules Diet Healing System and in Paul Nison’s talk ‘The Formula for Health’ that the less obstruction you have in your body, the greater the power and more importantly, the vitality you experience. You see, the fewer obstructions you ‘put’ in your body, ie, cooked and processed foods, stress and toxins in the form of mucus, the more vitality you experience. And after almost 5 years of being 100% raw, with many adjustments, tests, trials and errors, I’ve finally and clearly experienced that greater vitality. It’s been sneaking up on me the last few months and none clearer than today.

Another factor was conditioning. Although I hadn’t hiked during the winter, I stayed active working out at least 6 days a week. Normally 30-45 minutes a day including running and body weight exercises. I do and recommend the two exercises fellow raw vegan coach Roger has put together, and added my own twists to expand them and create a quick routine where I can exercise at home fast or at my local park. No equipment or health club expenses, just a quick daily workout routine.

You can learn more about what I’ve learned, what I recommend, get regular and exclusive meal recipe videos, meal plans, shopping tips, eating tips, your questions and answers and much more at our new site, Learn Healthy (Raw) Meals. This makes transitioning to a raw vegan diet straightforward with a plan and gives answers to your questions.  Check it out while the free trial is available. The feeling is incredible, share in this amazing experience with me!

To your best health!

Mark (aka the billy goat)

P.S. If you liked this post, Stumble it and share it below to help others learn more.

• Learn Healthy (Raw) Meals

There is a common misconception that just eating a better diet is enough to gain better health or lose weight. Yes, eating is one main part of the equation, but it’s only one part of the big picture.

Being that I exercise most every day, and have been for the last 20+ years, I thought I’d do an experiment. I stopped exercising for 3 days and observed how I felt.

Several things I noticed right away. First, it was very strange not to exercise! Although I felt good, I didn’t have the extra energy I normally have on days that I exercise. My sleep was normal, but I didn’t feel as refreshed. It was easier for stress to creep up on me, so I needed to do a little work to avoid any when normally it’s not much of an issue. I also noticed that after three days it was harder to get started exercising again. This appears to be what many experience… the longer you don’t move, the harder it is to start moving again. Disclaimer – don’t try this at home – keep moving!

After restarting my normal daily activities, I felt more focused, energized (in a peaceful and calm way) and slept more soundly. Life is good.

In doing a little more research, the evidence is pretty clear that staying active daily not only gives you more energy, it also reduces your chances of getting disease and extends your life among other things.

In a recent study, Finnish researchers found that poor cardiovascular fitness increases the risk of premature death just as much as well-known risk factors such as smoking, high blood pressure, obesity and diabetes. In fact, they found that unfit men, for example, were three times more likely to die from any cause, even after adjusting for age, smoking and alcohol use.

This shows very clearly how important daily activity and movement is to not only a healthy life, but a long life as well. Additionally, exercise is also an excellent treatment for insomnia, weight control, and reducing insulin resistance. It’s also a great help in the treatment of depression. In addition to the raw food diet, it’s another vital part of living a healthy lifestyle.

So the bottom line is to keep moving! Stay active regularly, try to exercise for about an hour a day. If you can’t do it at one time, break it up into smaller slots. And you don’t need a gym membership either. I do these two exercises at home or at my neighborhood park.

Here’s a tip I find that helps me. Working out first thing in the morning avoids interruptions and helps you to ‘earn your food’, increasing your chances of keeping your commitment to your health.

To your best health!
Mark